Emmanuel Macron faces revolt amid wave of strikes in France

Transport and public services were thrown into chaos across France overnight as unions and the left-wing opposition ­attempt to stir a revolt against President Emmanuel Macron.

French President Emmanuel Macron. Picture: AFP

Transport and public services were thrown into chaos across France overnight as unions and the left-wing opposition ­attempt to stir a revolt against President Emmanuel Macron six months into his second term.

Rail services, schools and health services were affected by a day of strikes over low pay and falling living standards that organisers hope will force Mr Macron, 44, further on the defensive in an autumn of troubles. With discontent mounting over inflation, Mr Macron’s centrist government is also facing anger over refinery strikes that have closed a third of the country’s petrol stations, leading to a chaotic scramble for fuel.

Struggling to legislate after Mr Macron’s party lost control of parliament, Elisabeth Borne, the Prime Minister, has resorted to an unpopular decree mechanism to push through the 2023 budget later this week. The left-wing CGT union, which led the 24-hour stoppage, aims to extend the rail strike indefinitely, riding the tide of discontent reflected in an Ipsos poll this month that found that 35 per cent of French citizens are angry about the state of the country.

Although the context has changed, the Macron administration is haunted by fear of an insurrection like the gilet jaune (yellow vest) mutiny that shook the ­regime in the winter of 2018-19. Doing his best to foment revolt is Jean-Luc Melenchon, 71, the firebrand figurehead of the Nupes ­Alliance, the left-wing bloc that became the main opposition in elections in June.

“We’re going to have a week like no other,” Mr Melenchon said as he led an “anti-system” protest of what the organisers claimed was 140,000 people through Paris on Sunday.

He had urged his supporters to act like the revolutionaries of 1789 who forced King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette from Versailles to Paris.

“We are entering a particular and quite extraordinary cycle. Everything is coming together. It’s a march of the people who are hungry, who are cold and who want to be better paid,” he said.